The provision of commodities for feed, food and energy production is the main task of the agricultural sector but it is obvious that agriculture is also essential for the viability of most rural areas. Although the consequences of agriculture on the landscape are extensively described, the...

There is increasing evidence that improved agricultural technologies benefit smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa. This evidence is however relatively clearer for innovations in smallholder crop production systems as compared to innovations in livestock production systems. Moreover, it is...

The continuous aging of the EU population poses important challenges to the sustainability of welfare states. Part of the solution is to ensure that people not only live longer but also better (i.e., can function independently while remaining free of disease and disability), which may be...

Poor diets and rising obesity rates dominate the current food, nutrition and health policy debate in many countries, including Spain. Despite the increasing obesity rate in Spain, there has been no known published research in Spain that has studied the economic factors affecting obesity...

Developing the capacity to assess and chart trends in the sustainability of farming and food production is becoming increasingly more important as agriculture strives to produce more food while minimising the risk to the natural environment. The multi-faceted nature of sustainability is...

Value creation is the result of the continuous innovation activity of the entrepreneur, which is carried out mainly in form of open innovation among the agri-food SMEs. However value creation is not the ultimate goal of the enterprises. They are more interested in increased appropriation of the...

The post 2015 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) reforms may bring a substantial change in the way farm payments are paid in Scotland where earlier farm payments were based on historical entitlements. Scottish farms now have to follow a Basic payment Scheme (BPS) which would be determined under a...

The paper investigates determinants of quality upgrading in the European Union agri-food exports using panel data models in the 2000-2011 period. Employing highly disaggregated data we show that export unit value is positively associated with level of economic development and the size of...

Regulatory impact assessment (RIA) for food safety policy interventions faces major obstacles, like scarce data availability and quality, especially when estimating their future effects on consumer health. In this paper, we run a preliminary RIA exercise on alternative EU policy initiatives to...

This paper analyses an incentive payment-based approach to improving food safety in the supply chain. It develops a principal-agent model of the food supply chain in which the principal offers heterogeneous agents a payment to implement costly additional practices to improve food safety. It is...